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The AP recently reported on tens of thousands of walruses that have been forced ashore in northwest Alaska because their usual habitat, sea ice, has melted.

This footage from the USGS, via National Geographic, shows an astonishing aerial perspective of the walruses, crowded together on the beach. The situation is especially dangerous because walruses are easily spooked, and the younger ones can be trampled to death in a resulting stampede. Because of this, the area has been declared as a no-fly zone.

According to National Geographic, this is the first time this many walruses have taken to the beach in this particular area, though similar incidents have occurred in other parts of Alaska and Russia in years past.

“It’s something that we have never seen before in this area,” said Geoff York, of the WWF’s global Arctic programme. “As the ice decreases, the walrus are abandoning it earlier and earlier. They are having to swim ashore, or to linger on less suitable drift ice for long periods of time.”